After I stopped trying, a rich woman trained me into a demon emperor.

Through this eyeball, the Imperial Prince detected the Golden Gu's devouring behavior outside the barrier between the two worlds.

Even though his eyeballs were shattered, the Emperor had already memorized this scene.

Xiao Rou's voice cracked, and she shouted from the very bottom of her chest.

"Eat! Eat it all!"

The five wings of the golden gu trembled violently.

The three broken wings, under the infusion of Emperor-level rules, actually grew a new skeleton, and the membranous wings unfolded anew from the skeleton—six wings.

The inherent potential of the Domain Heart Pill was fully unleashed under the catalysis of the Emperor-level rule fragments.

The golden gu's mouthparts closed, and its barbs crushed the remaining half of the eyeball.

The black and gold fragments were all poured into the insect's body.

The Emperor's voice was shattered into fragments, stirred twice within the Gu worm's body, and then extinguished.

The eyeballs shattered, and the imperial emblem dissipated.

The bottom of the crack was empty, with only a layer of charred ash remaining.

The hidden nail has been removed.

The golden Gu fell from above the crack, hit the black iron base, bounced twice, and rolled to Xiao Rou's knees.

The insect shell shrank to the size of a fist, and a thick layer of black-gold patterns appeared on its surface, covering the original dark gold color.

The six wings were neatly folded together on both sides of the back.

It didn't move, but the light deep inside its shell was brighter than ever before.

Devouring fragments of Emperor-level rules is equivalent to forced evolution.

Xiao Rou lay on the ground panting, all ten of her fingers covered in blood, and her ears were ringing incessantly.

She reached out and picked up the golden pot, her hands trembling so much that she could barely hold the bowl of water.

The worm burrowed in her palm, its six new wings opening slightly before closing again.

It had all its barbs tucked in, and was as docile as a cat that had just had a bath.

Xiao Rou's tears fell onto the insect's shell, one after another.

When the third underground level quieted down, most of the fluctuations of the Emperor-level rules in the air had dissipated.

The scorch marks on the array walls were still there, but the cracks had stopped expanding, and the dark golden rust had also stopped spreading.

The hidden nail has been removed.

The core foundation of the White Pagoda Formation has been preserved.

Xiao Rou sat next to the black iron base for a long time to recover, until the ringing in her ears subsided, the bleeding from her finger stopped, and her breathing went from being labored to being able to speak.

She turned to look at Lin Qingxue.

The woman was still leaning against the side of the base.

After seven days without food or water, Fa Mu's original essence was exhausted to the limit, and his whole body looked like a withered branch that had been drained of moisture.

But her eyes were awake, and the last glimmer of silver light in her pupils fell on the golden Gu.

"We did it."

Lin Qingxue's lips twitched, barely managing a smile.

Xiao Rou gently placed the golden Gu on the ground, took out a small bottle of spiritual liquid from the Gu box, and brought it to Lin Qingxue's lips.

The elixir was given to her by Chen Ya. It wasn't of high quality, but it was gentle enough to prolong her life.

Lin Qingxue took two sips from the bottle opening, her chapped lips glistening with moisture. Her Adam's apple bobbed several times as she swallowed, almost like swallowing a piece of broken tile.

"Sister Lin."

Xiao Rou put the bottle of spirit liquid aside and squatted down in front of Lin Qingxue.

"Emperor Zhou Ran sent me here not only to remove the nails, but also for another matter."

She turned the golden gu over, belly up, revealing the inner shell of its carapace.

The hidden runes that Zhou Ran had branded onto the shell with the essence of the Demon Emperor surfaced under the trigger of Xiao Rou's magic.

The gold lettering is extremely small, embedded in the deep texture of the carapace.

"Find Lin Qingxue. Have her carve that scan record into the shell of the Gu worm and bring it back."

Lin Qingxue stared at that line of text for a long time.

She recognized the strokes of the gold lettering.

Zhou Ran's writing habits have never changed. He starts horizontal strokes with a heavy stroke and ends them with a light stroke, while he applies the same force to vertical strokes from beginning to end, just like using a cleaver.

He signed several documents while at the White Pagoda; his handwriting was messy, but he had a strong frame.

It's exactly the same as the base of this line of cryptic text.

Lin Qingxue raised her right hand.

My fingers are trembling.

It wasn't the kind of trembling that comes from weakness; it was a forceful effort to control my emotions and prevent them from spilling out.

The dark gold corrosion marks on her forearm were still there, and her original essence was barely enough to protect herself, but the moment her fingers touched the golden Gu shell, she steadied herself.

"Initial view of the scan record."

Lin Qingxue's voice regained some of its former clarity.

"From the moment he stepped into the White Pagoda passage until he stood before the array and uttered his first words, the Dharma Eye scanned the entire causal network of his body."

The data contained hidden markings left in his body by the scribe, the key to deciphering the second use of the Bone Pen, and a complete topological diagram of his own causal lines.

She closed her eyes.

The afterglow of silver light surged from the depths of his pupils and gathered at his fingertips.

An extremely thin layer of silver light covered the back of the golden goblin's shell, and the inscription began.

The amount of data is too large.

The information density recorded by the all-around scanning of the array far exceeds the storage limit of conventional arrays.

Lin Qingxue had to compress, encode, and arrange each data point, and then carve them one by one into the gaps in the texture of the Gu shell.

This task doesn't consume much of the essence of the Dharma, but it demands extremely high mental strength. If any data point is engraved in the wrong place, the entire record becomes worthless.

Xiao Rou sat beside her, shielding her from the wind.

There is no wind on the third underground level, but the Gu shell will generate a slight magical vibration when it is being engraved. Any disturbance from the external airflow will affect the accuracy.

Xiao Rou used her body to create an area less than an arm's width wide, and squatted there without moving.

The burning process lasted a full fifteen minutes.

Lin Qingxue's fingertips moved from the upper left corner to the lower right corner of the back of the Gu shell, moving extremely slowly and steadily along every inch of the path.

A silvery light stretched into an extremely thin line between her fingertip and the shell of the insect, and data flowed along this line into the deep layers of the shell.

When the last data point was settled, Lin Qingxue's finger paused for a moment.

The silver glow had dissipated to the point where it was no longer visible to the naked eye.

In that short period of time, nearly 10% of her original spiritual energy was consumed, and the little she had left was barely enough to light up a room.

She didn't stop.

The fingertips slid from the back of the carapace to the most hidden flank crevice.

That's where the six wings fold and overlap; even if you examine the Gu worm from every angle, you won't notice anything hidden in that crevice.

Lin Qingxue carved an extra line of characters in that crevice, the characters were extremely small.

Even when Xiaorou puts her eyes just three inches away, she still can't see what's on the screen.

But she saw Lin Qingxue's expression after she finished carving those words, and she smiled.

After seven days of tension, the shell finally let out a long breath.

The fine lines at the corners of her eyes smoothed out, and her pale face gained a touch of warmth that only a living person would have.

The thing I'd been holding onto for so long was finally handed over to the right person, and I felt a huge weight lifted off my shoulders.

Xiao Rou's nose tingled with emotion.

She didn't know what the text said, but she knew it didn't belong to the scan record.

Scan records are data, codes, and densely packed symbols and coordinates.

After carving that line of words, Lin Qingxue's fingers lingered on the Gu shell for three breaths before she withdrew them.

The pause of three breaths has absolutely nothing to do with data recording.

Lin Qingxue withdrew her hand and leaned against the base.

Her breathing was even shallower than before, and her eyelids were drooping.

Both physical and mental energy were exhausted, and consciousness began to blur.